Sometimes I think I am living in parallel universes. On one hand the Australian government is running a very comprehensive Royal Commission into Institutional Responses to Child Sexual Abuse. The commission is hearing the stories and listening to the evidence of survivors of child sexual assault. The stories are told; the survivors are having their day in court and are listened to with compassion, courtesy and sympathy.
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Once the flood gates opened we watched senior religious leaders from all denominations, and a variety of different institutions that had previously denied or shut down any inquiries, now appearing in the public arena apologising humbly and profusely for ignoring the ill done to so many children. A cardinal refuses to return from Rome to face the survivors. The voices of children were ignored in the name of protecting the good reputation of their organisations. After the churches we saw institutions, including orphanages, the boy scout movement, the Salvation Army, private schools, sporting clubs and a host of others, “fessing up”.
There is a second parallel. Television showed this week a happy picnic atmosphere in the grounds of the newly renovated Lodge, residence of prime ministers in Canberra, with 300 parliamentary families attending. Among them are a number of children of all ages. Did any of these happy, partying families pause for a moment to consider a fearful group of refugees in Darwin, anxiously awaiting their fate to be determined by those same parliamentarians cavorting around the immaculate grounds of the Lodge?
In my third parallel universe the Australian Government is returning mothers, newborn babies and children from Darwin back to refugee camps off-shore, camps that are the responsibility of the Australian government. These refugees, particularly the children, have already suffered abuse and sexual assaults in these camps. They are being treated in Australia for medical and mental health reasons. Children are self harming. Women and children are traumatised by their conditions on Nauru; their daily lives are spent living in fear of being returned forcibly to further sexual abuse and assaults. Doctors who courageously speak out protecting their young patients are threatened with jail.
How is the situation of refugees different to that which we read in daily reports of the Royal Commission? There will be more Human Rights Commission studies, this time into the treatment by the Australian government of refugees risking the lives of their families to find a better life. Yes, many refugees paid people smugglers, but I would too if desperately hoping to rescue my family from the brutal tyranny of war in my country. For some there is no choice.
The parallels in this story are extraordinary. We are witness to three different scenarios, one of past events, two of the present. Can we never learn from history? The treatment of refugees will return in the future to haunt the government of the day, just as stories of the stolen generation and adopted babies removed from their mothers have returned to haunt us. A Royal Commission will be established and the whole process will begin again, this time hearing the heartbreaking stories of the refugees.
This is a defining moment to show leadership Malcolm Turnbull. It is a test of human decency, of compassion and responsibility to protect those most vulnerable in our society. Australia is better than this. We must not fail these people. We must not send them back to Nauru. Why can’t we ever learn?